Metal is defined by songwriting. A metal sound is not a sufficient condition. In my opinion it is also not a necessary one.Same goes for vocals. If you delete the vocals from a metal song it doesn't magically become another genre.

Metal is defined by songwriting. A metal sound is not a sufficient condition. In my opinion it is also not a necessary one.Same goes for vocals. If you delete the vocals from a metal song it doesn't magically become another genre.

does that mean some 'metal covers of non-metal songs' were metal all along, or that they still aren't actually metal?

Metal is defined by songwriting. A metal sound is not a sufficient condition. In my opinion it is also not a necessary one.Same goes for vocals. If you delete the vocals from a metal song it doesn't magically become another genre.

does that mean some 'metal covers of non-metal songs' were metal all along, or that they still aren't actually metal?

That they still aren't, unless the cover tweaks the song (tremolo picking, using actual metal riffs while more or less following the structure of the original etc.)

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I don't know about riffs "sounding metal", but when I said "sound" I was referring to the technical side like distortion and stuff. A flute certainly doesn't sound metal but you can play metal riffs on it all the same. The term "sound" is kinda ambiguous I guess.

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Under_Starmere wrote:

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Metantoine wrote:

If Summoning is the sugar of fantasy metal, is Manowar the bacon?

Last edited by inhumanist on Mon Oct 29, 2012 3:41 pm, edited 1 time in total.

What what? Is the sound of a flute metal? Can you play certain notes in a certain order on a flute that make a metal riff? Does it stop being a metal riff if you play it on a flute? If you play it on a flute does it sound metal? *Sigh*, I guess I should just shut up.

Edit: Yes a metal riff doesn't necessarily sound metal if it's played on a flute for example, that was what I was getting at. If it does it's because the term "sound" is not clearly defined.

inhumanist is talking about sound in the sense of "texture" (distorted or not, performed by a violin, performed by a church organ, ...) as opposed to sound in the sense of "taste" (metal riff, jazz solo, trip-hop beat, flamenco hand-picked melodies, ...). He does have a point. From a strictly musical standpoint you can replay the main riff of 'Iron Man' note for note on a flute. Or a set of wine glasses. The thing is that distortion and guitars (or in some cases other string instruments) are a pretty much fundamental part of what defines metal, so "metal sound" more often than not bears both flavours of the word "sound". The same can probably be said about any genre. It's not just the songwriting but also the tools used that are defining and sometimes unique to a genre, in addition to the former and the latter influencing each other.

Just for the record, Tori Amos' Slayer cover is also heavily altered in a compositional/musical sense. It's not simply 'Raining Blood' played note by note on a piano. I'm not a musician, I'm sure the similarities are there (in terms of chord progressions maybe? it's been a while since I heard that one), but yeah.

True about Tori Amos, but it's still equally retarded to consider an hypothetical note-for-note piano cover of Reign in Blood as being a metal song (as opposed to, you know, a piano version of a metal song, much like the above youtube example is a medieval folk cover of a metal Iron Maiden song and not an actually metal song).

Playing note-for-note covers of metal songs with different instruments does not make those covers metal just because the original was, anymore than playing note-for-note metal covers of folk or pop song make these songs folk or pop. And that's just covers. Can anyone list me a single metal band that uses no guitars (or similarly stringed instruments) and only, say, flutes? Of course not. That there's even a discussion about it is absurd.

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Von Cichlid wrote:

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Markeri, in 2013 wrote:

a fairly agreed upon date [of the beginning of metal] is 1969. Metal is almost 25 years old

Playing note-for-note covers of metal songs with different instruments does not make those covers metal just because the original was, anymore than playing note-for-note metal covers of folk or pop song make these songs folk or pop. And that's just covers. Can anyone list me a single metal band that uses no guitars (or similarly stringed instruments) and only, say, flutes? Of course not. That there's even a discussion about it is absurd.

That was the point I was trying to make, apart from explaining the two meanings of "sound".

The first two sentences here

Quote:

Metal is defined by songwriting. A metal sound is not a sufficient condition. In my opinion it is also not a necessary one.

Are another way of saying "distortion and heavy riffs =/= metal". Which you could reword as "A seemingly metal sound does not always imply metal." So far, so good. The third sentence is debatable and certainly depending on what kind of definition of "metal" you go by. I think it's very much necessary, not only for the purposes of the site, as I explained in my previous post about the interplay between and entanglement of "sound" and... "sound". It's also the reason we require metal riffs played on string instruments for accepting bands. Or, to a certain extent, forbid programmed guitars. Everything else is a comical perversion and an abuse of semantics to push technicalities.

I don't think metal riffs played on a flute are metal in the one sense that really makes sense, but I guess from a strictly technical standpoint you can say "this is a metal riff" or "this is a piece of music with compositional properties mostly associated with metal". It gets pretty absurd, you're right, but I wanted to stress that you can still refer to these things as being somewhat metal-sounding (in the sense of songwriting) without being a complete deaf lunatic.

Thanks Azmodes, that pretty much sums up the thoughts leading me to my viewpoint. But if people think that's absurd maybe it's time to reconsider. I mean a way of categorizing music is kinda useless if nobody agrees with you. Though I'm not gonna change my stance on how it should ideally be done...

That's the part I don't get. It's so bleeding obvious that it is indeed necessary that I don't see why you should even write "I think" (much like writing "I think the sky is blue"), and I fail to see how anyone could think it's not necessary. It's just so stupid it hurts.

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Von Cichlid wrote:

I work with plenty of Oriental and Indian persons and we get along pretty good, and some females as well.

Markeri, in 2013 wrote:

a fairly agreed upon date [of the beginning of metal] is 1969. Metal is almost 25 years old

The only band I can consider to be anything to do with metal and still being acoustic are Tenacious D (but they are a comedy band, so thats already not being taken seriously). I think when we mention the word metal we need heavy guitars for 99% of the time. Yes we can say that Sun0))) are metal in a way and there is an exception for them being on the MA but I guess you need to be really damn good and influential to be considered metal even if you not necessarily metal. Thats how I see things.

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Posted: Mon Oct 29, 2012 11:30 pm

I'm getting depressed reading this thread. When I go to a metal concert, I feel as if I'm with hundreds of brothers and sisters. At concerts of other genres, the people there do not seem so connected. To me, this is what defines metal more than anything. Can't we all get along and be the big happy family we should be?

The only band I can consider to be anything to do with metal and still being acoustic are Tenacious D (but they are a comedy band, so thats already not being taken seriously). I think when we mention the word metal we need heavy guitars for 99% of the time. Yes we can say that Sun0))) are metal in a way and there is an exception for them being on the MA but I guess you need to be really damn good and influential to be considered metal even if you not necessarily metal. Thats how I see things.

What? no. Sunn O))) are considered drone metal by the site standards and they're not an exception in any way.

Kale100, please don't get off topic with your ranting about the "Big metal family, we're all brothers of metal and sons of Odin" rant.

It's just something I really don't understand about this site, people are so quick to shit on others.

Singling out this site because a few people are mean? This site's pretty tame, really.

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Posted: Mon Oct 29, 2012 11:52 pm

Ozzy - I specified this site to indicate something more specific than humanity in general. I agree that it is still rather tame, but not as much as I'd expect from a collection of metalheads (who aren't in a moshpit of course).

I think it could, maybe. Depending on how well it's done and how many actual black metal elements it has. By this I mean tremolo picking, double bass sounding drums (fast bodhran perhaps), evil sounding whispered vocals, etc. Although it might not get added anyways.

Just start your band and don't worry if it's going to be admitted or not, just play music you like.